Solicitors to be freed from red tape for a ‘grown up relationship’ with regulator

The jargon is horrific but if — and it is a big if — you can get beyond that, the news is that solicitors are soon to enter a red tape-free world.

The regulator, the Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA), wants to move to an arms-length regulation. The authority avoids the phrase light touch — but that is what it is. Firms are to be allowed, in essence, to regulate themselves.

Announcing the plans last week the authority said that it wanted to move to “outcomes focused regulation” — what it calls a “risk-based regulatory regime based on core principles and the high-level outcomes firms must achieve”.

What does this mean? It could be good news for firms but the primary concern must be the impact